George,
I draw the liners that I use in eCabinets so I can make sure they fit. This one has a Dacor Liner. By installing this I know that I need two 3/4 spacers on the sides to mount the liner in this hood. It also lets me know where to cut the hole in the top.
Kerry

That's an excellent presentation Kerry ! I like the way you build your cabinets with the full length left and right stiles. I use that method also and I think it gives a nice finished look. Is that a garage door on the corner, or a pocket door ? Great work as always.

John,
This is the most lights I have ever used to render a view but it worked for this room.
There are three chandeliers overhead and one at cabinet height. There are also cans in the hood and window valance with an intensity of 8.
The chandelier outside the room has an intensity of 40, the other two overhead have intensities of 10 and the one at cabinet height is 20. As you can see I used several different textures so that I can adjust the shine of different parts of the cabinets and objects to create a more realistic view. The lower light levels enrich the colors in the room. The biggest mistake I see members doing is too much light. Use as little light as you can and simply change positions of the lights to highlight cabinets. You may have to move the lights for every rendered view that you do.
After rendering my views and saving them as jpegs, I take them into Irfanview give them a gamma correction of +1.20 to 1.30 to brighten the views without washing out the colors. The slide show photos were all done this way. The photo above was also taken into PhotoShop where I added a slight Gaussian blur to create a little haze in the room.

Kerry Fullington wrote:...There are also cans in the hood and window valance with an intensity of 8.The chandelier outside the room has an intensity of 40, the other two overhead have intensities of 10 and the one at cabinet height is 20...

Thanks, Kerry. Terrific rendering!!!

I don't understand HOW you are setting the intensity for each individual type of light. I am unable to locate a control that allows me to do that.

Kyle,
I have around ten to twelve hours in this design. I have had as many as 40 hours in a design. It all depends on how the space works, how many changes have to be made and how much detail I want to provide such as do I show all of the moldings, do I profile both edges of the counter tops or just one? I can spend several hours adjusting lighting and textures and display objects. I wanted dishes in the glass cabinets but eCabinets locked down every time I tried to place them so I gave up.

Al,
Render your view then right click on the light fixture you want to change and choose adjust light intensity and set a value. If you want an intensity of less than ten, enter a value in the numerical entry box by the light intensity slider at the bottom of the render then right click on a light and choose Apply Dialogue Settings. Repeat for every light. Once you get all the intensities set you can exit and hide the lights and render the view without the fixtures showing.
Kerry

Last edited by Kerry Fullington on Tue, May 29 2007, 7:47PM, edited 2 times in total.

Kerry Fullington wrote:...Al,Render your view then right click on the light fixture you want to change and choose adjust light intensity and set a value. If you want an intensity of less than ten, enter a value in the numerical entry box by the light intensity slider at the bottom of the render then right click on a light and choose Apply Dialogue Settings. Repeat for every light. Once you get all the intensities set you can exit and hide the lights and render the view without the fixtures showing...

I had no idea that you were able to do the light adjustment in the rendered image. I will try it, Kerry. Thanks!

Another great rendering Kerry! Keep up the good work. Do you go to this extent for most bids or only for serious clients? I am just curious. I seem to spend too much time rendering just to hear the client want to see changes. Recently, I redesigned a kitchen 3 times, then they decided to put the kitchen in a different room! Lots of time that I don't get paid for...

Brian,
I do renders for just about every job and yes it eats up a lot of time. There still isn't a lot of work here so I feel I have to do this, most new construction comes from out of town and the contractors already have their own cabinet guys. I have to give it my best shot on every job and I have become a free design service to a lot of people because of this. I kept track of my design time last year and I gave away around six weeks for free.
My biggest problem now is ideas. I am completely burned out. Most of my customers don't even give me pictures from magazines that they like. They have no idea what they want. I used to have a solution for just about everything but I am all used up. I have some furniture pieces, and entertainment center and a reception desk that I may lose because I simply have no ideas. They all want something \"Unique\" and my stuff is coming out Walmart.
This is where it would be nice if many members would contribute to the Design Sharing Library. I would love to go to the member store and click on Entertainment Centers and have 30 or 40 eCab designs to pick from.

Where do all of your ideas come from? Many shops do more jobs in a month than I do in a year. I would like to know how you keep fresh stuff flowing.

Thanks for the input Mike and Kerry. I do need to try to not give away my time. I just hate to use L.F. to bid a job. Mike do you have a price per L.F. then add for drawers, corbels, goodies and such? Most of my customers show me several magazine pictures and I am supposed to figure out what they like about each of them and convert into one style. I get other ideas from trade magazines and also from others on this forum. Many of my recent jobs have been Shaker so it has been rather simple designs. I am now working on a raised panel K. Alder job with Barley Twist posts and rope crown, 2 wine racks, toe kick skirts, and big corbels. It's a little different. I'll post the rendering when I finish.